John Frame on Doubt and Assurance
A couple of months ago I wrote about the Emerging church and suggested that a movement which celebrates doubt is a movement which Christians should not be eager to join. I suggested that this movement (or conversation, as they prefer) values doubt over assurance, seeing doubt as being somehow more humble and godly than assurance. Over the past week or so I have been reading John Frame’s Salvation Belongs To The Lord (look for a review next week) and came across an interesting section dealing with assurance of salvation. I thought I would share that passage today. I realize that is is not directly applicable since some within the Emerging church doubt not only assurance of salvation but really any kind of theological assurance. Yet I believe Frame provides much biblical wisdom on the subject of doubt.
“[T]he Bible presents doubt largely in negative terms. It is a spiritual impediment, an obstacle to doing God’s work (Matt. 14:31; 21:21; 28:17; Acts 10:20; 11:12; Rom. 14:23; 1 Tim. 2:8; James 1:6). In Matthew 14:31 and Romans 14:23 it is the opposite of faith and therefore a sin. Of course, this sin, like other sins, may remain with us through our earthly life. But we should not be complacent about it. Just as the ideal for the Christian life is a perfect holiness, the ideal for the Christian mind is absolute certainty about God’s revelation.
“We should not conclude, however, that doubt is always sinful. Matthew 14:31 and Romans 14:23 (and indeed the other texts I have listed) speak of doubt in the fact of clear special revelation. To doubt what God has clearly spoken to us is wrong. But in other situations, it is not wrong to doubt. In many cases, in fact, it is wrong for us to claim knowledge, much less certainty. Indeed, often the best course is to admit our ignorance (Deut. 29:29, Rom. 11:33-36). Paul is not wrong to express uncertainty about the number of people he baptized (1 Cor. 1:16). Indeed, James tells us, we are not always ignorant of the future to some extent and we should not pretend to know more about it than we do (James 4:13-16). Job’s friends were wrong to think that they knew the reasons for his torment, and Job himself had to be humbled, as God reminded him of his ignorance (Job 38-42).
“But as to our salvation, God wants us to know that we know him (1 John 5:13)…”
I believe Frame is correct on several important accounts. The Bible presents doubt largely in negative terms. Doubt is not presented as a reason for pride and assurance is not presented as something that is shameful. And in fact, doubt is a hindrance to doing God’s work and is the very opposite of faith. A person who is filled with doubt may well be a person of weak faith. An ideal faith is one that has absolute certainty about God’s revelation.
And so we are to pursue assurance, for assurance of salvation and assurance of God’s revelation is the mark of faith, not something that is opposed to it.
Comments (12) »
1. Jeri
June 3, 2006
3:08 PM
Thanks for these good words, Tim. I recently realized that behind some low times in my life there was lurking doubt in God’s goodness. I didn’t even realize it was doubt until the Lord showed me, by His word in Hebrews, that “he who comes to God must believe that he is, and that He rewards those who seek Him!”
“Of course, this sin, like other sins, may remain with us through our earthly life. But we should not be complacent about it.”
That’s the thing isn’t it? What good news…God helps us in all our infirmities.
2. Linda McDermott
June 3, 2006
11:37 PM
I have recently doubted that “God is love” is the entire story.
Having just completed a bible study in Genesis, I began to see a God who was capable of completely wiping away anything he chose. My classmates focused on the mercy of God in His saving one person, or one family, from devastation. But my attention was focused on the millions lost.
One particular homework question had us look up the word “fire” in a concordance and see how often it applied to God. I think there were over 250 verses. I began to see God as fire, and Jesus as the light - of fire!
Other verses jumped to mind that spoke of wrath and rejection of peoples, and individuals, who felt they were part of the family of God.
Three things happened as a result of my thinking this way.
One, I began to speak to others about my thoughts. They looked concerned and assured me that God is love and they would pray for me.
Two, I found that my perception of God grew and grew as I focused on his loving and fearsome characteristics. I am so thankful He IS a huge, majestic, powerful and mighty God. That’s what is needed to fight the battles in this world. I do not want a loving God who is patiently waiting for people to turn to him. That only makes him about the size of a credit card. My fierce and mighty God has power and authority over this world and me!
Thirdly, I have just begun reading “The Bondage of the Will” by Martin Luther, and have found he wrote on this very subject over 500 years ago. My heart soars to read his answer to Erasmus’ assertion that “God is kindness itself”.
God is mighty and sovereign. He will have mercy on whom He will have mercy, and He will have compassion on whom He will have compassion. A person with weak faith is someone who has never been touched by God and filled with the Holy Spirit. A person truly saved may not know anything else in this world BUT that he is now a child of God because his heart is flooded with profound faith that transends anything he has ever felt.
Likewise, we cannot pursue assurance. We pray with our face to the ground before this fierce God that He will have mercy on us. The assurance comes flooding into us at the moment of salvation.
3. DLE
June 3, 2006
11:46 PM
Yes, this is a terrible trend in the Church, especially among postmoderns and twenty-somethings.
I wrote on this topic a couple years back, if anyone is interested:
Doubt: The New Faith?
4. Brian Thornton
June 3, 2006
11:56 PM
“A person with weak faith is someone who has never been touched by God and filled with the Holy Spirit.”
“Now accept the one who is weak in faith, but not for the purpose of passing judgment on his opinions. One person has faith that he may eat all things, but he who is weak eats vegetables only. The one who eats is not to regard with contempt the one who does not eat, and the one who does not eat is not to judge the one who eats, for God has accepted him.” - Romans 14:1-3
“But take care that this liberty of yours does not somehow become a stumbling block to the weak. For if someone sees you, who have knowledge, dining in an idol’s temple, will not his conscience, if he is weak, be strengthened to eat things sacrificed to idols? For through your knowledge he who is weak is ruined, the brother for whose sake Christ died.” - 1 Cor. 8:9-11
5. j
June 4, 2006
12:12 PM
Note 1:
But we should not be complacent about it. Just as the ideal for the Christian life is a perfect holiness, the ideal for the Christian mind is absolute certainty about God’s revelation.
a. There is a difference between trust and apodicticity. One ?knows? one?s spouse loves one through trust and commitment: it does not follow that this love is a logical or metaphysical necessity. The very meaning of faith depends on belief across uncertainty; it involves an affirmation of contingency. To erase all contingency is to erase faith: conceptual, i.e. onto-theological certainty is bad faith.
b. If by ?revelation? one means eternally and necessarily true propositions rather than a specific fidelity to the person of Jesus Christ, then one has a mythic, even quasi-pagan, view of ?revelation.?
Note 2:
As Frame points out, not all doubt is ?negative,? unless we figure Job, David, and the poet of Ecclesiastes as somehow inferior to us in terms of strength of faith. It would seem the Emergent Church displays a faith that affirms an element of contingency. Indeed, how can one announce fidelity to Jesus Christ without faith? Affirming contingency does not equal renouncing normativity, but rather calls for rethinking, prayer, and accountability in which we understand and apply those norms: it precisely entails ?conversation?.
Note 3: And so we are to pursue assurance, for assurance of salvation and assurance of God’s revelation is the mark of faith, not something that is opposed to it. If one has faith, why would one need to pursue ?assurance?? Wouldn?t one?s spouse get rather exasperated if one obsessively sought assurance of their love? Assurance is infinite task. Perhaps the truth of the entire tradition of ?assurance? is in opposing trust to pagan views of neccesity and clarity. We see through a glass dimmly, yet we trust our Lord. To seek to clean all the dirt off the glass is essentially impossible.
Note 4:
Frame: “But as to our salvation, God wants us to know that we know him (1 John 5:13)…”
One can memorize and recite countless systems of theology without knowing God. One can do exploits and miracles without knowing him. The scriptures themselves make a certain notion of ?assurance? waver; that is, any system of thought, theological or otherwise, that seeks to erase the very condition of assurance: uncertainty or contigency.
6. Dea
June 4, 2006
1:25 PM
I was discussing this post with my dad. He’s 82 and a wise saint - at least I think so ;) He was answering a young couple who were having a disagreement about assurance of salvation and wrote this:
“Use the Bible’s promises of assurance such as Romans 8: 28-38, Colossians 2: 2, 1 Thessalonians 1: 5, Galatians 2:20 KJV, Hebrews 6: 11 and 10: 22, Jude 1, and Romans 4: 21.
Assurance of salvation is a better term than “eternal security”. Simply put, since the Holy Spirit indwells me, I have nothing to fear. Relax in the knowledge that both of you are in Christ and that He is in each of you. All the rest is nit-picking and “doubtful disputation”.
One’s sense of being eternally secure is directly related to the amount of time one spends with the Assurer/Securer. Infrequent Bible Study , prayer and fellowship yield doubt. Religion yields lack of assurance; Christ gives constant assurance.
Paul cuts through all the murk by announcing that the one essential for salvation is the Holy Spirit living in you, Romans 8: 9. If He does not, then you are not His. Even so, partial ignorance will be our portion until we finally see Him, 1 Corinthians 13: 12.”
Dad says a big HI to Tim Challies and he loves your site :)
7. Jonathan Erdman
June 5, 2006
3:13 PM
I would agree with Frame and with the general tone of Tim’s comments that the Bible speaks positively about assurance. But I note two things.
First, Jesus never condemned the doubt of Thomas, but rather gave him evidence to bolster his faith. This would be an example I would cite to support the fact that doubt can be ok. I think the dialogues of Job and Hezekiah also bear this out.
Second, and most importantly, many Christians who celebrate assurance might be somewhat dissapointed when they explore the grounds for this certainty. When Christians are overly simplistic about assurance it is often because they have a simplistic (and non-biblical) view of the grounds for faith. For example, we do not always find in Scripture that belief and certainty is found at the end of an argument. Faith is rarely defined and even when it is (i.e. Hebrews 11) the definition is somewhat obscure. The point is that assurance, like faith itself, is not easy to understand and is a process that is not simple to define. We might ask Frame what the grounds are for faith. I believe that he would be the first to admit that there is not a simple answer, at least that’s what he seemed to indicate in Five Views on Apologetics.
To tout the claim that all the good Christians “just believe and have assurance because unbelief is sin” shows great parallels with the foolish friends of Job who reduced the world and God’s work in the lives of people down to a nice little formulaic answer key. Discouragement and doubt seem to be commonplace amongst those who are most seriously engaged with God and with the world: Elijah is suicidal, David shows signs of serious depression in the Psalms, Moses wants out, Thomas doubts the resurrection, Peter betrays Christ three times, Abraham doubts God’s plan and marries Hagar, John the Baptist doubts Jesus’ Messianic claim after spending a career preparing the way for Jesus….
Assurance is great, but it’s a little unrealistic to reduce it to a sin issue or even to say that one is “more spiritual” because they do not doubt. I say that Scripture gives us examples that reveal that those who doubt often do so because they are more engaged with God and have laid it all on the line…
8. Jeri
June 5, 2006
4:36 PM
Jonathan, I think you’re confusing times of doubt and uncertainty, which yes, all Christians will go through in this life, with chronic, nurtured doubt that is more like unbelief. Jesus rebuked Thomas, telling him not to be unbelieving, but to believe. “Blessed are they who did not see, and yet believed.” Faith is a gift, not something we can drum up ourselves. When we doubt God, we must go to Him for help, with the confidence that He will help us, because He wants us to be believing.
Where was the claim made that “all good Christians just believe and have assurance because unbelief is sin”? There probably aren’t very many people, if any, who read and comment on this website who believe anything like that.
9. Jonathan Erdman
June 6, 2006
8:20 AM
Jeri said…. Jonathan, I think you’re confusing times of doubt and uncertainty, which yes, all Christians will go through in this life, with chronic, nurtured doubt that is more like unbelief.
Jeri, Could you please explain how a Christian can be in a time of dark doubt and uncertainty (as most prominent biblical characters have experienced) and yet still not be “unbelieving”?
I think it is the very nature of doubt and uncertainty to drain us of belief.
10. Jeri
June 6, 2006
2:08 PM
Hey Jonathan,
Surely not drain us of belief! Faith is a gift of the Holy Spirit, and we are to be filled with the Spirit.
Doubt becomes sin when we knowingly believe our doubts over what God’s word says. We may struggle and hurt and agonize, but as long as in the end we are saying, Lord, I believe Your word above everything I feel and all the whispers I hear to the contrary, then I believe we have done well in His sight. And I think that is the pattern you see in the heroes of the faith you mentioned.
I have gone to the Lord many times in great pain, fear and doubt and asked Him to help me, and He always has. After every bout with that kind of darkness, my faith in Him has emerged stronger and my joy has increased. We can’t expect to deal with doubt on our own any more than we can with lust or other temptations.
Jeri
11. Jonathan Erdman
June 7, 2006
2:02 PM
Jeri, Thanks for the thoughts. By and large I can agree with your perspective - with one little exception!
Jeri said… Doubt becomes sin when we knowingly believe our doubts over what God’s word says.
I still don’t buy into the concept that doubt = sin. You talk about “believing” doubts over and against what God’s word says. But doubts are not something you “believe.” Doubts, by definition, are the struggles we have over our currently held beliefs. When we doubt we are not renouncing our beliefs, nor are we given over to new beliefs - we are in limbo. It is a deep struggle on an intellectual and spiritual level. It is an ambiguous and strange state of being. For this reason, I prefer to leave the issue of doubt open and ambiguous and I draw back from making broad generalizations about whether doubt is sin.
12. Jeri
June 7, 2006
10:57 PM
Jonathan,
When you say “currently held beliefs” I’m not sure what you mean. My currently held beliefs are what I understand the Bible to say about something, or that for sure God will open my eyes to understand everything He wants me to.
But I definitely get the feeling that in some of your thinking you are coming from the emergent camp Jonathan, is that right? Not to take up Tim’s thread with too much conversation. :)